Page 67 of A Study of Blood and Ichor

“We thought we lost you. But it won’t ever happen again. I promise.”

The sincerity and desperation in his words held a weight I wasn’t prepared for. He spoke like he…like he cared about me. My chest tightened suddenly, my expression stuttered. My lips parted, but no sound escaped them, so I pressed them shut again, completely unsure how to respond. What words could be enough when his admission wrenched at my heart, and the few inches of my skin that he touched felt as if he were igniting a fire in my blood?

Rory must have noticed my hesitation, because he cleared his throat and broke eye contact before releasing me. “I can finish up. You should go. Let Alastair know if you need anything.”

“But your hands…” I reached for him again. “Let me bandage them.”

Rory drew back. “They’ll heal. Just go.” His voice was cold. He dragged a hand down his face and hung his head again so the water made his hair into a dark curtain, shutting me out.

I rinsed the remaining suds from my hands and left him, not caring that I was still soaking wet and leaving a trail along the floor as I made my way back to my room.

My wrist ached, and the ghost of Rory’s touch remained as a faint memory on my skin. Even his words had left me rattled, and I couldn’t shake the echo of them, no matter how hard I tried.

After pouring the steaming elixir into a mug, I passed it off to Alastair. “Bring this to him, please.”

The demon blinked back at me, and it felt like each of his eyes held a different emotion. He hadn’t left my side since the moment I’d stepped foot into the kitchen. He was quiet and attentive as he watched me work. “Ava, you’re shaking. Are you sure you're alright?”

“I’m fine,” I said too quickly. When I poured the next mug, I fought to keep my hands steady. “I’ll take this one to her.”

Sweeping past Alastair and out of the kitchen, I found Dru in one of the guest rooms and told her to drink. She was apprehensive at first, but once she’d swallowed the last few drops, she sank into the bed and drifted off quickly. I stayed with her for about an hour after that, just watching her and occasionally stroking her head to soothe her if I noticed her jerking in her sleep. It was the least I could do for her, and it still didn’t feel like enough.

When I eventually returned to my room and crashed into bed, my sleep was fitful and restless. Flashes of the memories that Ilo had dragged up were still drifting on the surface of my mind, plaguing my dreams and my nightmares with unsettling clarity.

I woke in the middle of the night to a faint, haunting melody floating throughout the penthouse. Peeling my eyelids open, I squinted at the thin slivers of light peeking through a break in the heavy curtains. The echoes of the stringed music were rich and melancholy, and I laid there for a while just listening in the dark, my face cold as I shifted on the pillow which was still damp from the shower earlier.

With my nerves still frayed from my encounters with both Ilo and Ghen, I decided that I had no hope of falling back asleep, so instead, I slipped out into the hallway in an oversized T-shirt that hung past my thighs and made my way through the penthouse in search of the source of the music.

It didn’t take me long to find it. Rory sat in the middle of the darkened great room, his chair facing the tall panoramic windows with a cello between his thighs. He was bare-chested, and a pair of gray sweatpants hung low on his hips. I kept my distance, not wanting him to notice me or stop in the middle of the beautiful song.

The melody was filled with immeasurable longing, deep and resonant. The tempo was slow, rising up into rich and powerful crescendos and then falling down into soft droning lulls. Each glance of the bow across the strings filled my chest with a familiar ache, and the vibrato that hung in the air whenever his wrist rocked against the neck of the cello made my heart swell. The bow slowed before it tapered off the strings and the final note echoed into silence. Rory’s shoulders slumped forward, all the tension he’d been holding in his posture releasing at once.

“Rory?”

His head half-turned in my direction slowly, like he’d already sensed me before I had spoken. “How’d you know it was me and not Vain?”

“It’s the way you hold yourself. You’re more…relaxed. It’s a subtle difference, but I think I can tell now.”

Rory sighed softly through his nose. “Did I wake you?”

“Yes, but it was a beautiful song. I don’t think I know it.”

“You wouldn’t. It’s one of theirs.” The way he said theirs, I understood he was referring to the demons. “Vain’s fond of it. He hums it in my head all the time, so I play it sometimes. I think it’s comforting to him.”

I shifted my weight to my other foot. “I didn’t know you played.” I realized I didn’t know a lot about Rory. And maybe I wouldn’t mind learning more if he let me.

He rested the bow across his lap. “I used to play professionally before…”

Before he was possessed. Before Vain. The unspoken words cleaved through my chest.

“I didn’t mean to interrupt you. I’ll leave you to keep playing.” I sounded like an idiot.

“No.” Rory’s voice stopped me in my tracks. “Stay.”

I stood achingly still, unsure of myself, unsure of what he wanted.

He leaned the cello carefully onto its side on the floor next to him, then curled a finger at me. “C’mere.”

My heart practically leaped from my chest, but I moved toward him hesitantly. I paused beside him, and he looked up at me, his eyes so piercing in the darkness that they caught me off guard. Rory patted his thigh, indicating for me to sit.

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